Boxes
by Polly Put The Kettle On
Summary: 1st person one shot of the scene between Lol and her family in TIE '86 - what is revealed about her back story is quite brief, so I thought this might be interesting. A few spoilers I guess if you haven't seen episode 2, all reviews welcome!


The stale taste of ten years ago rose in Lol's throat. He sat on the sofa, leant forward, arms resting against his thighs, stooped back, as if it _were _ten years ago. Sitting beside him, like she hadn't heard his fists throw that stupid bitch around the room every other night, was Kelly. The stupid bitch sat just to the right, eyes on her hands.

With her own hand, Lol felt for the door handle. If she could feel it, then she wasn't stuck in that box. It was as if there were no windows and the air was becoming thinner and thinner until soon she would be breathing pure oxygen. Telling herself he wouldn't do anything while Kel and Chrissie were there was the only thing keeping her calm. She couldn't look at his face; it was easier to stare at her mum instead and ask her with her eyes _what the fuck _he was doing there, though she was long past needing answers.

'Hiya Lol.'

He had been the only person that didn't call her that. He called her Frances, which she'd hated even before everything. Kelly was looking down at her hands too, and that bitch was looking at him, her face hard and stolid. _Watch yourself_.

He pointed to her, smile cracking from that pit of a face.

'You look great love.'

There wasn't time to be angry over this, though when she got out of there she would be. He hadn't seen her for years. Before she and Kel had bleached each other's hair, though not before she had let Woody take a men's razor to her head. She could remember how it had stung in places, how the hair falling around her feet had been like sickness dropping away from her heart. Walking home that evening she had never felt so light, the wind cool through her fringe, tingling along her scalp, the taste of Woody still on her lips.

Chrissie sat watching at the kitchen table, mouth sealed shut. He stood to one side, chest heaving, as she fumbled in the fridge for a bottle of milk. As she drank from the bottle, the glass cold against her lips, he asked her what the fuck she had done.

Even now she was still able to recall the sound those two words made as they passed from her mouth. The feel of his fist against the back of her neck; the pressure as she fell and her forehead found the hard edge of the cooker. She'd never told him to fuck off before, and as good as it made her feel she regretted it afterwards.

She looked over at Chrissie.

'You can't be serious.'

Her mum looked like she was holding something back in her throat, and her eyes remained fixed on the coffee table. Kel stood, her voice the only sweet thing in the room.

'Lol, I was gonna tell you, but with the wedding and everything.'

She was right; had Kel told her after that failed wedding that their dad was walking around in their house again, using their bath, sleeping in their mum's bed, she would have done something stupid. _I was gonna tell you_. Of course Kel knew it was wrong. It was all wrong, or Lol would have been the first to know. But if so, why was she sitting there with a photo album on the coffee table, playing happy families. Didn't either of them see that elephant quivering in the corner of the room?

She looked at Chrissie, who kept her eyes on the ground. Lol longed to drag her up by her hair, force her to look.

'You're really this stupid, mum?'

'Your dad's changed, love.'

Chrissie's first words came out loaded. _Your dad_. She wanted to scream, to make noise in that tiny room; she knew if she did let her voice rise any louder, it would break and she would resort to something she hadn't done in years.

'He's changed?'

She left it dangling, still nothing.

'Yeah, I have-'

And though it was him talking, defending himself like he always did, she asked Chrissie instead.

'Changed. Changed how? Changed his haircut, changed his socks? Changed?'

Chrissie shook her head, like Lol was a tired little child who needed to be put to bed.

'Lol, please.'

She closed her eyes, and opened them on Mick. He was as he had always been. Thick beard and balding like a man half as dangerous as he was. With that beard she could never truly read his emotions, and she had learnt to taste them in the air.

'I'm back for good, I promise.'

Blood stung like acid in her veins.

'I've missed your mum, and I've missed my two girls, so badly, sweetheart.' They were words from someone else's mouth. 'All I'm asking you for Lol, is a second chance.'

He spoke as though he hadn't already had hundreds. She watched herself, in another world, nodding, sitting down with him, letting him put his arm around her. She wasn't ever going to be that person again.

'Come on Lol, let's have a cup of tea, eh?'

Chrissie was finally looking at her, though her eyes settled just an inch away from her own.

'Lol, he has changed, I promise.'

And finally she couldn't stand it any more, hearing Kel say that with so much conviction. She couldn't sit and know that her sister really thought her dad was someone other than what he was. She never had been able to hate Kelly, even in her sweet oblivion, she was her baby sister; the only part of her family tree not rotting away.

'He's not the man you think he is, Kel.'

Her eyes dropped.

'Woah, what the fuck does that mean?'

And the act was gone. He wasn't lying any more. There was Mick as everything he was; everything she knew him to be.

'I see you.'

His mouth stayed open, like it always did, and those eyes bored into her.

'I know you, I know what you're about.'

'Yeah, and what's that then?'

Kel's face was all fear. A carbon copy of those days when Lol would take her outside as their dad shouted, and teach her how to blow smoke rings. Kelly would pretend she wasn't scared, even when her face gave her away.

He stood, and somewhere inside, Lol was relieved that he was finally being himself. She wouldn't see him smile again, she knew that.

'Well, it's not normal is it?' Her hands were on fire and vomit tickled the pit of her throat. She swayed forwards on her feet and stepped just an inch more into the room. 'Coming into little girl's rooms in the middle of the night.'

And finally the bitch broke.

'We are _not _starting on this again. I'd kicked him out of bed, he'd gone looking for somewhere to have a kip, _you _got dramatic.'

The excuse sounded feeble, even shouted that loud in the tiny room. Kel's face sunk into a sudden retreat, trying to push back into her own head, fighting in vain to get away from them all. He held up one finger, breathing out shock. She wanted to scream at him, tell him she'd done it, dare him to make the next move. He pointed briefly to Kel.

'Go upstairs please, Kel love.'

'Stay there.'

'Go upstairs please love.'

Even quieter the second time. 'Stay there.'

Her sister had always followed in her footsteps, from gangs to haircuts. Today she stayed true to her word.

He pointed that finger again, like a teacher in a playground. So unlike him. If she pushed aside her feelings for a moment, Lol could almost understand him. If he used his fists it would be over for him.

'You've gone low, you have, you've gone very low.'

She remembered the first and only time she had shouted. He'd looked a bit like he did now, open mouthed. Chrissie had rushed in, dressing-gown tugged to her shoulders, yelling _what? _He had stood by her single bed, hands up. The scream kept coming, loud and fast, even when Kel appeared in the doorway, teddy in her arms. Three or four at the time, maybe. Lol pushed how old she had been to the back of her mind with all the other trash.

'D'you want me to go into a bit more detail?'

'Shut up, _right_ now!'

The bitch was up on her feet then, index finger jabbing. He kept telling Kel to go upstairs, though you could be forgiven for thinking she had gone deaf.

'Kelly does _not _need to hear this, alright?'

Lol held a hard face, even looking right at her mum, watching all that hatred channelled so purely towards herself. One thing Mick had taught her, was that she didn't have to show people when she was scared or hurt, she could turn it off like a light-switch.

'Does she not?'

Sweat or tears gathered in the corners of her eyes.

'Oh, you are fucking poison.'

She finally had Chrissie looking right at her, no restricted viewing, brown eyes on blue. 'You always have been. That's why I weren't at your _wedding_.'

And that stung. Even if she hated her mum for being so good at turning a blind eye, that stung.

'Oh, _right_-'

'Because of you and that fucking head of yours.'

'Right.'

'Now go on, _fuck off _out of my house!'

It had been their house once. Kelly flinched on every syllable. Mick just stayed staring.

'Don't worry. I'm gone.'

She took a long look at Mick, let him see her as she opened the door. Then she let herself out of the box.


End file.
